jocose

comparative more jocose · superlative most jocose

1. formalGiven to jesting; habitually jolly.

   The American people, / With grins jocose, / Always survive the fatal dose.

   1941, Ogden Nash, “Look What You Did, Christopher!”, in The Face Is Familiar, Garden City Publishing Company, page 223

   2 more examples

   Adde to this diſsipated and diſtracted ſtate of Miniſters, their private diſtreſſes and poverties, together with the publick neglect and indifferency of people toward them; who can wonder if they look pitifully one on another, which no jocoſe or juvenile drolings can relieve?

   1659, John Gauden, chapter XXXI, in Ίερα Δακρυα [Hiera dakrya]. Ecclesiae Anglicanae Suspiria. The Tears, Sighs, Complaints, and Prayers of the Church of England: […], London: Printed by J[ohn] G[rismond] for R[ichard] Royston, […], →OCLC, book II (Searching the Causes and Occasions of the Church of England’s Decayes), page 251

   Jocose flesh-eaters take a malicious delight in pointing out and enumerating to Vegetarians the many animal substances now in common use, and in taunting them with inconsistency in using them.

   1886, Henry S. Salt, “VII: On Certain Fallacies”, in A Plea for Vegetarianism and Other Essays, page 80

2. formalPlayful or humorous; characterized by joking.